Blood In the Stands II

Posted on Wed Aug 6th, 2025 @ 10:39pm by Survivor Harley Bell

1,902 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Winter's hope
Location: Lambeau Field, Green Bay
Timeline: 25 August, 2010

Malik
The bass thumped through the floor of the VIP box, a low rumble that vibrated pleasantly in Malik’s chest, blending with the roar of the Lambeau Field crowd. He leaned back into the plush leather, one long leg crossed over the other, a half-smile playing on his full lips. His grey-green eyes, sharp and intelligent, were currently tracking the blur of green and white on the field. Thirty-two years old, at the top of his game, and currently enjoying a damn good view of America’s sport. Life was good. This was a pit stop, a rare moment of downtime in the relentless grind of his current national tour. He had all the game and money he knew what to do with, and they were wrong when they said it couldn’t buy happiness.

“Yo, Malik, check out that pick-six!” Jamal, his head of security, rumbled beside him. Jamal was a mountain of a man, solid muscle, with a perpetually serious expression that rarely wavered, even for a highlight reel play. He looked like he was carved from granite, and his presence was a constant, comforting weight.

Malik just nodded, taking a slow sip of his top-shelf whiskey. "See, Jamal," he drawled, his voice a smooth, captivating rumble, "this is why we build in these little 'cultural immersion' days. A man can't just be about the studio and the stage. You gotta connect with the culture, you feel me? And this," he gestured grandly at the field with his glass, "is pure, unadulterated soul. Though," he added, a wry glint in his eye, "I still think my last show in Philly had more energy than this entire stadium. No offense to these fine folks in Green Bay.”

Brenda, his manager, a formidable woman with a hearty laugh and a penchant for all things delicious, was already making inroads into the platter of artisanal cheeses and cured meats. "Soul, or an excuse to watch rich men throw a ball around?" she quipped, without looking up, a sliver of prosciutto disappearing. "Though I gotta admit, the catering in these boxes is a definite upgrade from stadium hot dogs. Malik, you gotta try this brie. It’s divine.”

“Divine..” Malik chuckled, a low, rich sound. "Brenda, always makin her plate. I’d rather eat my own snot than that shit." He took another sip, his eyes twinkling. "But tell me, where else do you get this kind of drama? Look at number 88 on the Colts, he just dropped that pass. Man's gonna be hearing about that all week. Probably gonna write a diss track about himself." He paused, taking in the full, vibrant scene. "Me? I’d just get the beat ready and turn that failure into fire. That’s the difference between a gridiron and a mic. You lose on the field, you wallow in that shit. You stumble on the track, you pivot and drop a masterpiece. That's the hustle."

He was mid-sentence, about to launch into a humorous anecdote about a forgotten lyric during a particularly rowdy show, when the atmosphere in the stadium abruptly shifted.

It started subtly, a ripple in the lower stands, like a fight breaking out. But the screams that followed were too high-pitched, too panicked for a mere brawl. Malik, with a street instinct honed over three decades in New York, felt the shift immediately. His smile evaporated, his eyes narrowing, the casual humor draining from his handsome face, replaced by a steely focus.

“Yo, what the hell is that?” Brenda asked, her voice tight, a half-eaten cracker forgotten in her hand. Her phone was forgotten on her lap, her usually jovial face now etched with genuine alarm.

Below, in Section 123, a cluster of people were no longer just screaming. They were scrambling, clambering over seats, their faces contorted in pure terror. A shape, too low and too fast, lurching forward, and a sickening thud echoed, even through the stadium’s immense noise.
Then, it truly broke. A wave of collective horror surged through the crowd. More screams erupted, from multiple points now. Not just one fight, but dozens. The ripple turned into a tidal wave of panic. On the colossal jumbotron, they cut away from the field to a wide shot of the stands, inadvertently showing pockets of absolute, unadulterated pandemonium. People were falling. People weren’t getting back up. Or, worse, they were getting up wrong.
Malik was on his feet now, his tall, slender frame still and commanding despite the burgeoning pandemonium around him. His gaze was hard, cold, full of the street energy he was born into. This wasn't a riot. This was something different. Something primal. Something wrong. They were debating the causes on the news form months before this moment, but the government had told everyone the situation was under control. Clearly it wasn’t.

He watched as the mass of humanity below them began to flow like a broken dam, everyone surging towards the exits, a desperate, crushing tide. The sounds of breaking glass, distant sirens, and the rising, inhuman growls now cut through the stadium’s speakers. Every member of his entourage had snapped to attention.

Marcus and Dwayne, two of Jamal’s top security men, were already moving, checking the reinforced door of the suite and the entrance to the adjacent, often empty, private lounge Malik also had booked. Rico, another silent, watchful security presence, stood near Malik’s brother.

Janine, his junior assistant, young, shapely, and usually eager to please, had dropped her tablet and now stood frozen, her eyes wide with uncomprehending terror. Freddy, Malik’s childhood friend and roadie, usually cracking jokes, had gone utterly pale, his mouth slightly agape as he stared out at the unfolding horror.
Shawn, Malik’s brother, normally quiet and observant, was now glued to his brother’s side, his eyes mirroring Malik's grim focus. The rest of the small group – a couple of other low-key assistants and personal staff – were huddled, some fumbling for phones, others just staring. This was his inner circle, his ride-or-dies, and they were all looking to him.

On the field, the players, previously locked in their own intense battle, finally registered the cataclysm erupting around them. Their movements, once rehearsed and precise, dissolved into uncoordinated panic. Helmets clattered to the turf as players, both Packers and Colts, pointed, shouted, and then, as one, bolted. They weren't running plays anymore. They were running for their lives.

Malik watched as the two teams, a mass of green and white, and blue and white, sprinted en masse towards their respective locker room tunnels. Smart. They knew the layout, they knew the fortified spaces.

"Jamal!" Malik's voice cut through the growing din in his own box, calm and resonant, despite the chilling tableau unfolding before them. "Seal the suites. Now. Marcus, Dwayne, Rico, secure those doors. No one in, no one out. Brenda, get on the emergency comms, now! See who’s still answering. Freddy, Shawn, help them barricade. Janine, get a headcount of everyone in the suites. We got to move. This ain't no game."

This was happening everywhere, if the news stations had anything to say about it. His grey-green eyes scanned the VIP suite. He was already calculating. The thickness of the glass, the reinforced doors, the contained environment. A temporary sanctuary. But he knew, with chilling certainty, that it wouldn't be enough. Not for long. He needed to secure a larger space. He needed to take control. And Lambeau Field, designed to contain thousands, was suddenly the only fortress in sight. The hustle was truly on.

bHarley
The lower concourse was a maelstrom of bodies. The main exits were no longer bottlenecks; they were solid walls of humanity, screaming and shoving, with the terrifying sounds of breaking bones and desperate, dying cries echoing from within the crush. Sprinter-fast, the undead were already clawing their way into the throng, adding to the horrific pile-up. Harley’s stomach clenched. There was no going that way.

“They’re completely stopped up!” Connor gasped, pulling back sharply from the surging crowd. His face was green, his serious demeanor overwhelmed by sheer terror.

Patrick, for once, wasn’t making a joke. He was just a pale, wide-eyed nineteen-year-old, looking to Harley for guidance. “What do we do? Where do we go?”

Harley scanned frantically. The air was thick with the reek of blood, fear, and something else – a coppery, putrid smell that made her gorge rise. The shouts were punctuated now by the unnerving groans and snarls of the turning.

"We hide," Harley stated, her voice firm despite the tremor in her hands. She dragged them away from the main concourse, pushing them towards a less trafficked hallway that led deeper into the stadium’s bowels, past restrooms and smaller vendor kiosks. “Forget getting out right now. We need to get somewhere safe.”

Her eyes darted, searching for anything. A janitor’s closet. A locked storage room. Anything with a solid door. The stadium was a labyrinth of such spaces. She spotted a nondescript, metal door, tucked between a beverage cooler and a closed novelty stand. It had a heavy-duty handle and looked like it hadn't been painted in years. A small, laminated sign, half-peeled, said "Supply Closet - Authorized Personnel Only."

"In here!" she hissed, trying the handle. Miraculously, it clicked. Maybe a custodian had forgotten to lock it in the rush of game day prep.

She shoved Patrick inside first. He stumbled, catching himself on something metallic within the darkness. Connor followed without a word, his eyes fixed on the chaos spilling down the hallway behind them. Harley glanced back once, seeing a shambling figure turn the corner, its arms outstretched. She slammed the door shut, the heavy metal clanging loudly.

Click! Thump. Click-click-click.

She fumbled with the handle, finding the small, rusty bolt latch and throwing it. Then, with a surge of desperate adrenaline, she found an additional, heavier deadbolt mechanism and slid it home with a satisfying thunk. She could hear the snarls just outside the door, the unmistakable thump, thump of something heavy hitting the metal.

They were plunged into near-total darkness, relieved only by faint slivers of light around the edges of the door. The air immediately felt stale, thick with the smell of cleaning supplies and cardboard.

"What is this place?" Patrick whispered, his voice oddly small in the sudden silence of their refuge, broken only by the distant, muffled screams.

"A supply closet," Harley breathed, pressing her ear to the cold metal of the door, listening to the horrifying sounds just outside. "Just a supply closet."

It was a small space, perhaps 8 feet deep by 10 feet wide, crammed floor-to-ceiling with cases of paper towels, industrial-sized cleaning bottles, boxes of plastic cups, and various stadium sundries. There was barely room to stand, let alone sit comfortably. They were standing shoulder-to-shoulder, the three of them, in their own little metal box.

Connor, ever the pragmatist, turned his phone's flashlight on, illuminating their cramped prison. His eyes immediately went to the lack of windows, the solid walls. "How long do you think we have?" he asked, not of the zombies, but of the air itself.

Harley didn't answer. She just clutched her brothers closer, listening to the sounds of the world ending just beyond their thin metal shield. For now, they were safe. For now, it was enough.

 

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